USAID Launches Five-Year, $13M Project To Fight HIV/AIDS in Uzbekistan
USAID on Tuesday launched a five-year, $13 million effort in Uzbekistan to help the country improve its ability to fight HIV/AIDS, UzReport.com reports. The project, called CAPACITY, aims to strengthen the technical capability of Uzbekistan to combat HIV/AIDS and develop local organizations and networks to help control the spread of the virus (UzReport.com, 3/29). The CAPACITY project will focus on HIV/AIDS prevention among vulnerable populations, including injection drug users, commercial sex workers and youth, according to a release from the U.S. Embassy in Uzbekistan. In addition, the effort will improve access to voluntary HIV counseling, testing and antiretroviral drug treatment, develop models to advance the integration of HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment efforts with ongoing health care reforms in the country, and show linkages between HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis (U.S. Embassy release, 3/29). The United Nations has said that the number of registered AIDS cases in Uzbekistan -- 11,000 -- is a small number for a country with a population of 25 million, the Associated Press reports. Some experts believe the number of HIV-positive people could be 10 times higher and increase rapidly because of widespread injection drug use, according to the Associated Press (Associated Press, 3/29).
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